Aches and pains
by spectersanatomy
Summary: Harvey is one of the most stubborn people you will ever, even when he gets a migraine, he refuses to admit his pain until it is too late to do anything about it.


Harvey Specter was the best closer in the city, but he was also the most stubborn person you could ever meet. Not only did he refuse to admit when he was wrong, but he also refused to accept that he couldn't do something. So, when he woke up that morning, a dull ache in his head, he did nothing but splash some cold water on his face, noting the grey-ish tint to it, and head out the door. He knew food would be a bad idea so he took a tylenol, skipping breakfast, and hoped for the best.

Upon arriving at the firm, he went straight up to his office, not stopping to speak to anyone, and nobody thought anything of it. But Donna knew. She had known for days that it was coming, even before Harvey did.

She noticed the increased irritability and snappiness. She watched as he held his head in his hands on his desk, she heard the grunts of discomfort over the intercom. And she noticed this morning, when he didn't greet her with a sarcastic comment, but instead walked slowly into his office, sat down at his desk and sighed loudly.

The man knew what was happening. He knew that in a few hours he would be in indescribable pain and unable to bear sound or light, but he had important things to do. Each year he only ever took one day off, and that was to go and visit his father's grave, no matter what, he was always there, and this was no exception. All he had to do was hope that nobody burst in - that he could be left in peace all day to take breaks when he needed to.

And that used to work - then he hired Mike Ross.

It had been no more than 15 minutes since he arrived that the young associate came bumbling through the door, way too energised for that time in the morning, to see what Harvey wanted him to do. He received no response and was just handed a stack of papers, which he didn't think anything more of, Harvey quite often acted in this way, he just had to ignore it.

Donna on the other hand grew increasingly worried for her boss throughout the day. After the first hour she could already see that he was uncomfortable, he started to press his thumb against his eyebrow as the pain built up, and was squinting at the papers in front of him. He had earlier been reading them on the laptop, but he had sent them to Donna to print. She knew that the light from the screen was causing him pain so handed them to him on paper in an enlarged font size, knowing that he would never dream of wearing his glasses while the rest of the office was there, even if they could aid his throbbing head slightly.

Within the next hour she had managed to successfully bat away all potential distractions, even Louis and Mike, but when Jessica came, it was a different story. There were only two people in the office who knew about Harvey's migraines, Donna, and Jessica. Having not heard anything from him for the whole morning she thought she'd go and check up on him. All it took was for Donna to shake her head for her to know it was bad. She asked her to either reschedule Harvey's meetings or move them over to her to allow him to rest, then returned to her office, planning to go back later to see him.

For the next few hours he got progressively worse. Not only was his headache becoming more intense, but his vision was starting to get worse too; everything out of his right eye started to go blurry and he felt suddenly light headed. Donna could see that he was in pain and when he skipped lunch, she thought she should go and check on him.

When she walked through his door she noticed that the blinds were only partially shut, so before she did anything else, she closed them completely. He winced at the noise, but seemed a little less uncomfortable once he was in darkness. She saw the bottle of Imitrex on his desk, but from the looks of things it was having no effect. If he had not been so stubborn and taken it when he first noticed the symptoms he probably wouldn't be in as much pain right now, but Donna wasn't about to kick a man while he was down, so she saved the I told you so's and the mother-like lecture for another time. Beads of sweat had formed on his forehead and his face looked more grey than it had this morning. He looked as though he could throw up at any given moment. He had also taken off his blazer and vest, and his tie was loose. Unlike normal, they weren't folded neatly and placed on another chair, they were strewn across the floor.

Her heart hurt a little for him. If it was anyone else, she would tell them to go home, but it was Harvey. That was the last thing he would do, so she gave him the look. The look that told him with no words that she had it all under control and he was free to rest. Without another word, the lawyer stood and slowly made his way over to the couch, taking slow careful steps and holding his head every inch of the way. Once he lay down, she turned off all of the lights in his office and moved the bin a little closer - just in case.

"Signal if you need me." She whispered before tip-toeing out of the room.

Harvey could hardly believe the agony he was in. He knew they were bad, but he had never had one this excruciatingly painful before. Normally the Imitrex did something to reduce the pain, but this time, it hadn't been numbed at all, he couldn't even think without his mind screaming at him to shut up. He never usually cried, but this had him on the verge of tears, not just the pain, but how frustrating it was that there was nothing he, or anyone else, could do about it.

Donna had been sat there for a few hours, and once she was sure that no one would attempt to enter for a few minutes, she ran to the copy room. Of course this was the exact time that a caffeinated Mike showed up and burst through the door to Harvey's office, too excited about his triumphant discovery to notice the state of the poor man.

The light flooding in, the noise of Mike's voice and the smell of the sandwich in his hand caused Harvey to gag and violently throw up in the bin next to him.

"Shit!" Mike shouted, not realising that that only made him worse.

"As Donna made her way back she saw the office door open and couldn't help but kick herself. She was certain that Mike had been around the corner waiting for his opportunity to sneak in, and she could tell from the shouts that he had taken it.

"Donna, there's something wrong with Harvey, I think he should-"

Before he could even finish she interrupted him.

"Go home? Nope. He won't do that, so there's no point in arguing with him, especially not now."

Mike looked at Donna a little confused and she dragged him out of the office, seeing Harvey ready to puke again out of the corner of her eye.

"So you know that he was like this, and you're letting him stay here?"

Donna sighed, she sometimes forgot how annoying Mike's childlike need to ask questions every five minutes was.

"It happens every so often, he gets a migraine, he sleeps in his office, then when everyone had gone home he leaves and is fine the next day."

"What can I do to help? Does he need anything?"

"God no, don't go in there again! You know what you could do, it would be a big help."

He looked eager to do anything he could, partly because of the guilt he felt for having made Harvey throw up.

"You could finish these files that Harvey gave me this morning for you."

At the mention of the word files his face dropped.

"Do your job Mike. That way Harvey won't have to worry that things aren't being taken care of."

He sighed, but went off to do it anyway.

For the rest of the day, Donna heard nothing from Harvey apart from a few grunts of pain on the intercom. She did poke her head through the door a couple of times and made sure that the trashcan was empty. She also replaced the water next to him every so often so that he didn't get dehydrated and made sure he took the Imitrex every two hours.

As she promised Jessica came back later to check on him, looking through the door and seeing him lying there, his hands squeezing his head tightly and his eyes squeezed shut with a grimace on his face. She felt bad for him, she did, but she wasn't going to handle it for him, if she knew Harvey, she knew that he wouldn't do something he didn't want to, and she didn't want to agitate him further. She told Donna to let her know when she was gonna leave and that she'd come down and keep an eye on him until he decided to leave.

Then Mike came. Donna saw him sheepishly walking down the corridor and it wasn't until he saw her looking at him that he walked at a normal speed.

"How's Harvey?" He whispered.

"You can talk normally, he's asleep and knocked from the painkillers. But he's gonna be here for a while, so you can leave."

Mike hesitated before answering.

"Sure?"

"Yeah, the less people here when he leaves the better."

When Harvey woke up, his head was still throbbing, and when he looked to see time it was late. There was a glass of water and a note on the table, slowly he reached to grab the paper.

Sorry, I had to go, but Jessica's stayed and she'll take you home when you're ready. There's some Imitrex next to the water, I was gonna wale you before you left but I just couldn't bring myself to. Feel better, see you tomorrow.

-D

Harvey probably wouldn't take anyone else's pity, but with Donna it was different.

Jessica couldn't help but giggle as she heard him move on the intercom. She wondered for a minute if he ever switched it off, but then thought again - it was Donna. She had never seen a lawyer and his secretary so close before, and she was glad that Harvey had someone like her. God knows how he'd get anything done without her.

She stood and headed into his office, picking up his jacket and beckoning her head to let him know they were leaving. He appreciated her not saying anything, after all his head was still spinning. They walked out of the office and Jessica drove him back to his apartment. She accompanied him up but knew better than to expect to be invited in.

Once the door shut, he went straight to his bed, taking his tie off of his neck as he did. He clambered under the covers and sighed as he rested his head on the cool soft pillow. Shutting his eyes, he prayed that this thing would be gone by the morning and that he'd be able to actually get something done with his day, but he had a feeling that Donna had kept Mike on his toes.

The only thing he wanted for the next day was for nobody to acknowledge it, and he knew that Donna and Jessica wouldn't, but Mike definitely wouldn't give him that. It would all be out of care, but it was bound to drive Harvey crazy.

He wasn't thinking about that, all that was running through his mind was how nice it felt to be lying there in the dark, and how grateful he was for the silence that surrounded him.


End file.
